Rune

Picked up an escort finesse 1.8TDDI (turbo diesel) estate, the body and interior are in such superb condition I just can't resist having a go at making it a bit quicker. I'm used to a Gti estate with a few improvements ... and that's quicker

One of the things I plan to do to start me off (or probably ply my mechanic mate with beer so he'll do it) is fit a turbo boost gizmo

From what I've read the fuel pump needs tweaking for this to be properly effective so I'm aware of that, but what about the intercooler?

Would it also be a good idea to fit a better (bigger?) intercooler or would it not make much difference?

If yes, does anyone know of one that would be a good fit? On the Gti some parts can be swapped out for 2.0 mondeo parts, I've no idea if that's the case for the diesels as it is with the zetecs

If the 2.0 mondeo one fits easily enough and will improve things I should be able to pick one up quite easily

Don't know if I'm understanding this correctly or not, but if the turbo's boosted would it be heating the air up more as it's compressing it, and if that's true I'm guessing a bigger/better intercooler would do a better job of dealing with the increased heat, and that's gotta be more efficient right?

I've read that boosting a turbo too much too often can lead to overheating and I'm thinking that an intercooler upgrade might help guard against this, not that I'm planning on overdoing it

bailey1981

You can do a few things to improve them
depending what fuel pump etc is on your car

A good area to start is the fuel pump
you can turn the max fuel up for low rev range power & turn the boost fueling up to increase fueling when on boost but the more you turn them up the more smoke you get & less economical they become like with any car weather petrol or diesel

you can also adjust the actuator rod for more boost pressure if i remember right you shorten it but your better off double checking to be 100%
With these few mods alone you will notice a big difference to the way it drives & responds when ya plant ya foot

before you alter the boost pressure (actuator rod)
It would be wise to either get hold of a boost guage or a device called a mighty vac
this will allow you to see what kind of boost pressure your making as too much will soon cause damage
if its not had a service & cambelt change recently id concentrate on doing this first as ya wouldnt want to do all the mods & then the belt snap on ya

this is how most 1.8d /td engines end up f**kin up
there fairly bullet proof & are generaly reliable this is why there used in a lot of old generators & canal boats

bailey1981

Theres a few links on this site regarding the pump mods & also i belive theres videos on you tube showing how its done

as for the intercooler this basicaly cools the air that is pushed out from the turbo before it enters the inlet so a front mounted cooler will help as the stock one sits on top & is more a inter warmer than coooler lol
i dont know if the inlet manifold & intercooler off a focus diesel would fit or not but it would be ideal as there front mounted on them
well near the slam pannel but with a bit of modified pipework you could convert it to a front mount set up

ive got all this to do on my van once ive got round to fitting the tdi engine so if you try the focus set up & it fits it would be good to know for future ref lol

hope all this makes sence to ya As i do tend to waffle on lol

alexno1dj

Ive done all this myself before and works a treat. good advice about the cambelt. The best video on youtube is the 306 td tuning guide as the same principals apply to the pump on the escort

heres the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4l5on3_IrA

Rune

Haven't had much time to mess with it as yet cos of my dad getting a kidney transplant plus he has other health issues which means I've almost become his full-time carer which doesn't fit too well with my computer repair business ... in other words, not much spare time for playing with the car

But so far I've done:

Complete timing kit change, inc tensioners, injector pump belt etc etc

Done away with the stock air filter pipe and filter box, the pipe on them seems to take a long & roundabout route to the ram pipe at the front of the engine bay, What I have now is just a small 45 degree elbow, the maf (which is off a 2.0 mondeo and I've polished it to a fairly high degree) is fitted directly to the elbow and a heatshielded cone filter fitted directly to the maf. Much better!

The pipe coming off the intercooler to the turbo wasn't fitted correctly, it has 'ribs' on it which I assume is to allow for extension/expansion and it looked like someone thought these were for the jubilee clip to fit into, consequently the pipe came adrift, fitted it back on poroperly so now the turbo actually works!

There was a lot of slack (easily two inches worth) on the throttle cable, I took out this slack using the adjuster where it fits onto the diesel pump, hardly any adjustment left on it now so I'm thinking it might be worth replacing the cable

I have read that the engine can be made to rev more freely by removing the throttle mechanism shock absorber, haven't done this cos I don't know know what the shock absorber looks like or where to find it lol

What I've done so far has made a huge difference to how the car drives so I've got off to a good start

I''m planning on a stainless cat-back exhaust next, then most likely fit a boost controller and take a look at upping the fuelling a little, the video that was posted looks like it would be useful here, but when I open it I don't get any sound

I also have some heat wrap left over that I thought I may as well put on the exhaust downpipe coming off the manifold, figure that might help make it less of an 'inter warmer' as it should help lessen the amount of heat rising off it and warming the bottom of the intercooler

I'm also liking the idea of front mounting the intercooler but I'm not sure if that's something I'd wanna take on doing myself, so I'll check out how much it'd cost me to get someone else to do it

Dan j

I have a tdi van and I'm going front mount intercooler, I have a focus tddi inlet, boost pipes and I have an assortment of mondeo tdci pipes and a eBay intercooler which I'm going to make fit when the weather clears up ill post pics when I tackle it. The shock absorber your on about is on the pump where the throttle cable sits so when you pull the throttle and let go it it closes slowly just pull it off and away you go.

Rune

I know why I couldn't find the throttle shock absorber now ... it's already been removed lol

Leads me to think someone's had a go at adjusting the fuelling already, between the absorber already being removed and there's a pipe that's been blocked off kinda points to it

Also the way it's going now I've got the turbo pipes correctly fitted and improved the airflow suggest it, turbo even seems to start spooling up somewhere around 1800-2000 depending on what gear I'm in

Don't know whether anything's actually been done to the turbo boost or not so I'm gonna fit a boost gauge at the weekend so as to get a look at what it's doing

Managed to pick up a focus st intercooler in superb condition off ebay for Ł28 delivered, guy had just listed it as 'Focus Intercooler' so no-one bid on it, figured even if I don't end up fitting it I can sell it on for a decent profit

When I get my other estate back on the road which I picked up a new head gasket for at the weekend I'll make a decision on whether or no to have a go at front mounting this focus st one

Got a spare head for the gti estate and I'm gonna have crack at porting and polishing that (with guidance & supervision from a mechanic friend) before fitting the gasket etc, so it's likely to be later in the year before I even look at the front-mounted cooler project

If you do front mount yours before I get round to tackling it on mine I'd appreciate a look at the pics if only to see where you run the pipes, looks like it'll be pretty awkward on mine cos of there not being much space they can fit in

Dan j

Get some pics up, Also have a look a pic of a focus tddi/tdci engine bay It will show you the inlet and how the pipes run over the rocker cover. My aim is to copy that then feed the pipes down the passenger side then join up to some mondeo tdci pipe work. The key is not to go to big with the pipe work otherwise it will be a struggle to get all the pipes in. ill need to block the egr off on this inlet as my current one doesn't have it.
I have the one pic so far of the intercooler in the bumper

The mondeo mk3 tddi/tdci runs a front mount as standard so thats why im using pipe work off that just google some pics to see what I mean.

Rune

As I say I won't be doing it just yet, but I was kinda thinking of using stainless pipe and silicon elbows where required, am I right in thinking that stainless piping would allow the air to flow through quicker than something like stock mondeo/focus pipes would?

I hear ya on not going too big with the pipes, also seem to recall reading that smaller diameter pipes allow for faster airflow which should help reduce the chance of turbo lag given the distance the air would be travelling shouldn't it?

I know smaller pipes means less volume of air but the surface area of the focus st intercooler is roughly twice that of the stock endura-de one so it should be sucking in a bucketload more colder & denser air than stock and getting it to the turbo as quickly as possible would be desirable and should balance out quite nicely right?